AIC's 52nd Annual Meeting

The Library of Congress (LOC) is the world’s largest public library, with over 170 million items, containing 838 miles of shelving in three buildings in Washington, D. C., and other facilities. Like any other institution, the Library of Congress struggles with storage space.

This paper will present the integrated approach to space management and collection needs: the Space and Emergency Management Survey -- the Stacks Survey, developed for the nearly 22 million books, pamphlets and other printed of the General Collections at the Library of Congress. Besides the survey methodology and results, it will emphasize how the survey design focused on the human component, using an innovative, inclusive, and equitable approach.

This is the first time in the history of the institution that such a large-scale survey for the General Collections has been conducted. Using tablets for portability, a team of 96 people is surveying around 95,000 sections in collections areas of the Jefferson and Adams buildings, where General Collections are stored, dedicating a one-90-minute shift/week/person to the project. The survey was developed with a minimum number of questions needed to gain the most possible data in key areas in a short time focusing on inventory, environmental risks, condition, and space issues and capturing images of sections. The survey of each section takes less than 5 minutes. As part of the survey, sections are also being documented with images, constituting the first ever comprehensive visualization of each section of the General Collections in the history of LOC.

As the Project Manager I have been responsible for engineering the design, planning the logistics, staff training and overseeing its implementation. This paper will share testimonials about how the survey has been empowering staff of various backgrounds conducting the survey and impacting their understanding of the collections, storage areas, and the role they play in sustainable preservation.

The stacks survey is an important initiative that will provide information to support preservation actions for years to come. But the impact on the team will go much further, beyond numbers.